


we are young supernovas, and the heat's about to break

by loonylu



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Burns, Canonical Character Death, Canonical Child Abuse, Child Abuse, Childhood Trauma, Drug Addiction, Drug Use, Drugged Sex, Gen, Gun Violence, Guns, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, Police, Recreational Drug Use, Running Away, Selective mutism - Juno doesn't talk for part of his childhood, Selling Drugs, Trauma, Underage Drinking, abuse by a teacher (canonical), food insecurity, implied molestation, not everyone survives growing up in oldtown
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-23
Updated: 2019-03-23
Packaged: 2019-11-28 10:31:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18207209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loonylu/pseuds/loonylu
Summary: mick mercury and the steel twins grew up together, and growing up in oldtown means growing up too fast. nine scenes from a childhood spent surviving.





	we are young supernovas, and the heat's about to break

When Mick meets Juno and Ben, Juno doesn’t say anything. Mick is seven, already gregarious and frizzy-haired, though a few years out from becoming the King of the Freeway. During recess for the first graders – much to his dad’s disappointment, Mick had to repeat kindergarten – Mick notices two identical little boys sitting quietly near the trash cans. The school building is gray, the air is gray with smog, the recess yard is all cracked gray concrete. Anything that’s interesting draws the eye when everything is so much of the same.

 

Mick is the kind of kid who likes to make friends. So he wipes his hands on his pants and jogs over to the two younger boys. They look up, squinting at him, but don’t say anything. Up close, they aren’t quite identical – one is bruised up, one eye swollen nearly shut, and he scowls at Mick for noticing. The other one, dark skin smooth and flawless, smiles. Mick does not know what to make of this.

 

“Hi,” Mick says, eventually.

 

“Hi,” the happy one says. “I’m Ben, and this is Juno.”

 

“I’m Bartholomew Mercury but I want you to call me Mick please.” Mick rattles off. He doesn’t like his name much, but that’s okay. Most people except his dad call him Mick.

 

“Okay, Mick,” Ben agrees. Juno says nothing, just watches Mick warily.

 

“Is Juno okay? Does he not like me? It’s okay if he doesn’t, my dad says I talk everyone’s ear off and no one gets a moment of peace. Is there anything I can do? I – “

 

“Juno’s okay, he just isn’t allowed to talk anymore,” Ben interrupts cheerily, getting to his feet. Juno stands as well, still glaring daggers at Mick.

 

“Can he talk?” Mick asks, interested.

 

Juno nods sharply.

 

“Yeah, he can, Ma just says he’s not allowed to say anything ever again since he threw our lives away because someone said please.” It sounds like Ben is reciting this from memory. “So now I talk for him.”

 

Mick nods sagely. “One time I talked so much my uncle Theo put tape on my mouth and it hurted a bunch when my dad took it off. I bet your ma will let Juno talk soon!”

 

Ben shrugs, eyes darting. “I dunno.”

 

“Wanna play blasters and Martians?” Mick proposes.

 

Ben and Juno turn to each other quickly. Juno whispers in Ben’s ear, and then vice versa. They break apart, and Juno nods enthusiastically, cracking a lopsided grin. Juno is missing his top two baby teeth.

 

“Cool! Come on! I want you to meet Sasha. She’s really nice. Her sister Annie is nice too and she’ll be in kindergarten next year, when you’re in first grade and I’m in second grade.“ Mick chatters, and Juno relaxes by degrees as they run and shove.

 

Juno does good blaster noises for playing blasters and Martians. Mick is impressed.

 

***

 

Juno doesn’t talk until October of second grade. Mick wasn’t there for the Mr. Lowell incident, but he heard about it – every kid in school heard about it. Mick has lunch with the twins now that they’re in second grade and he’s in third. Juno is conspicuously absent, not there to be the dark bruised shadow of Ben’s easy smile.

 

“Ben! What happened!” Mick calls across the lunchroom, Sasha on his heels.

 

Ben sniffs and wipes his eyes on his stained sleeve as the three of them line up for the free nutrient lunches all the kids with green school IDs get. Only a few kids – three or four – have plain white IDs they have to swipe to get lunch, and they complain that their parents didn’t refill their lunch accounts.

 

Despite Mick’s prodding and Sasha’s threats, Ben doesn’t say anything until they’re safely in the fake tree behind the gym. The fake tree is made of fiberglass, so they’re all washed in an amber glow from the filtered sun shining through.

 

“Did Juno really break Mr. Lowell’s nose?” Mick asks in a hushed whisper, sitting in the hollow extending out to the biggest branch.

 

“Yeah,” Ben sniffles. “Mr. Lowell was making fun of Juno for not talking and I was trying to tell him Juno’s not allowed to say anything, but Mr. Lowell said that was stupid and that I was stupid and then – and then – “ Ben gulps back a sob. “Juno ran up to him and punched him in the nose and then Mr. Lowell pushed him and Juno hit his head really hard on the floor.”

 

“What happened?” Sasha demands.

 

“Juno’s in Principal Calliope’s office,” Ben says. “And they wouldn’t let me go with him so he can’t say anything and if they call Ma – “

 

“They can’t call Ma,” a voice like Ben’s says hoarsely. The panel they use to get into the fake tree creaks open, and Juno stands there like a shadow. He steps in and sits next to Ben, bringing his knees up to his scabbed chin. “Ma’s comms got shut off last week, remember?”

 

All three children are shocked.

 

“Juno?” Mick says eventually. “Am I making stuff up again, or are you talking?”

 

“I’m talking,” Juno says, and reaches up to help himself to half of Mick’s lunch.

 

“But Ma will – “ Ben stops abruptly.

 

“I don’t care,” Juno says mulishly, mouth full of nutrient bar.

 

“But – “ Ben is near frantic with worry.

 

“I don’t care.” Juno finishes chewing, swallows, and grins. “She can’t shut me up forever.”

 

After that, Juno talks. Not much, but more and more each passing day. He’s covered in welts and bruises and cuts, but he smiles more now. Ben looks more and more worried – like they’ve switched places, like Ben is an unmarked shadow of battered Juno.

 

***

 

Mick goes over to Juno and Ben’s apartment precisely two times in his life.

 

 Mick is eleven, and the twins are nine, and Sasha is ten. Ages are important for them – things are getting bad, or they’re finally noticing how bad things are, and every day they make it through is starting to feel like more and more of an accomplishment. Mick is hungry most days, but he has it better than most of the other kids he knows. His uncle makes good money as a door-to-door salesman, but Mick doesn’t know what he sells. So when Mick gets sick, he gets to go to the doctor and he has all his vaccines.

 

Juno has run away again. He started running away after he started talking again, more or less. No one knows where he goes, except Ben, who refuses to tell anyone because they’re both afraid Sarah will find out. As they all get older, Mick understands just how dangerous Sarah Steel really is. Sure, Mick’s uncle smacks him, but he knows that isn’t the same as what happens to Juno at home.

 

He asks Ben about it, once. Ben just shrugs and turns away. He’s not dumb enough to ask Juno, who would definitely just punch him.

 

He’s not completely surprised when Ben throws rocks at his window in the middle of the night on a Tuesday. Both Steel boys have good aim – Mick lives on the fifth floor of his apartment building, but the pebbles all hit his windowsill instead of bouncing off the cheap plexiglass. Mick wrenches open the window and glares down.

 

“What’s going on?” Mick whispers loudly.

 

“Juno’s missing,” Ben hisses back.

 

“So? He’ll be back tomorrow like always,” Mick yawns.

 

“Mick! Just come down here!”

 

Shrugging, Mick shimmies out of his window and climbs down the fire escape, jumping the last few feet to land in the dust with a thud.

 

Ben has already turned back towards the Steel residence, which is eight dangerous blocks away. “Come on, Mick, we gotta go.”

 

Mick hurries to catch up. “What’s going on?”

 

“Don’t worry about it – I just need your help.”

 

“Ben, buddy, I need to know –“

 

“You don’t need to know shit,” Ben snarls, turning back to face him. Ben’s face is shining in the moonlight, tear tracks cutting through the layer of Martian dust.

 

A drug dealer is eyeing them from the corner. Mick pulls them both into a dark spot behind an abandoned van. “Benzaiten,” he begins.

 

“Ma put Juno’s hand on the stove burner,” Ben sobs, “and Juno ran out of the house and he thinks I don’t know he goes into the sewers when he runs away but I know and I’m so scared and he hasn’t been home since yesterday morning and that’s the longest he’s ever left – “

 

“Should we go to the police?” Mick doesn’t propose this lightly, but sometimes calling in the HCPD is the only option left.

 

Ben’s eyes widen. “No,” he insists. “They might take us away from Ma or separate us.”

 

Mick privately thinks the first part of that sounds like a great idea.

 

“We need to hurry,” Ben says, “We have to find him.”

 

Mick only nods and runs after Benzaiten as they cover the remaining blocks.

 

Oldtown is never quiet. There’s always flashing lights, arguments silhouetted in windows, homeless people sleeping propped against walls or in alleys. Growing up in Oldtown, Mick doesn’t find it terribly difficult to tune out the voices, slams, shouts, and occasional screams that surround him no matter what time it is. Looking back, Mick wishes he had paid more attention to the sound around him. No one has ever accused Mick of being overly observant.

 

When they round the corner, they see two men – two drug dealers, it’s easy to tell by how they carry themselves – arguing loudly. Normally, it’s easy to keep your head down and maneuver around the fights. Triad-affiliated dealers had a policy of not killing bystanders unless they could help it, Mick knew from the stories his uncle tells him that his dad would not approve of.

 

Then, suddenly, one of the men whips out a blaster and fires concentrated light at his opponent, missing his head by a hair. Mick can only watch as the light arcs downward and slams into Ben’s shoulder. Ben spins like a top, and Mick catches him before he hits the ground. If it was set to kill -

 

“Fuck,” the one who fired says, dropping his gun in the dust. “I – “

 

“Goddamnit, you shot a kid,” the other yells.  Both turn and run.

 

Ben is burned. He’s unconscious, but not dead. A blaster set to kill only does what it does if it hits its victim in the head or torso, Mick remembers frantically from another of his uncle’s stories. But he can see the meat of Ben’s shoulder laid open.

 

“Ben!” Mick hears a familiar voice yell.

 

Juno Steel, small body coated in sewer slime, cradling his left hand to his chest, emerged from a nearby manhole cover, causing a car to swerve and honk. Juno rushes over to Ben’s unconscious body.

 

“Juno, I’m gonna get your mom,” Mick says, getting to his feet. “Which apartment?”

 

Juno just nods, eyes fixed on Ben’s still face.

 

“Juno!” Mick grabs his shoulder, and Juno flinches. “Which apartment?”

 

Juno’s eyes are huge and luminous in the moonlight. “6B,” he says.

 

Mick runs inside, waits on the elevator, wills it to move faster as he presses the little faded 6 over and over again. He runs down the hallway, bangs on the door, no response, no response, he tries the doorknob. It opens, and Mick bursts in.

 

He stops for a fraction of a second, taking in the place his best friends call home. Piles of junk, a baggie of pills on the coffee table, molding dishes in the sink, the scent of rot in the air. Mick shakes his head. There’s no time.

 

“Miz Steel?” Mick shouts into the dark apartment.

 

A shape Mick took to be dirty clothes heaped on the couch stirs.

 

“Who the fuck are you?” the shape says, straightening up and fumbling for a cigarette. “Take whatever you want, there’s nothing here anyway.”

 

“Miz Steel, Ben is outside, he got shot, we need your help – “

 

Looking back, Mick swears Sarah moved faster than a human should be able to. Juno complains about it later. Complains she shoved him out of the way and picked Ben up and ran to Oldtown General without stopping, without looking back. Mick does not know what to make of a mother who burns one child and carries another to safety. Mick does not think he will ever get the full story.

 

Until the day Benzaiten dies, Mick never sets foot in the Steel apartment again.

 

 

***

 

Mick sees Sarah hug Juno one time, and he almost misses it through the tears in his eyes. They are all standing outside of Faust’s, watching the HCPD swarm the building like ants. Annie’s parents are sobbing, Sasha is standing still and blank-faced, and Mick’s dad lays a hand on his shoulder, sniffling as well. The HCPD has been searching for hours now, and no one is saying what they all know to be true.

 

Juno is crying silently, standing off by himself. Mick wants to reach out, but he thinks his dad will never let him out of arm’s reach again. The sun is setting slowly, casting deep shadows.

 

It is in this half-light that Sarah Steel walks up behind her son. She touches his back, and he flinches. He’s prepared for a blow. Instead, Mick sees Sarah gather her son close and let him cry into her shoulder. Mick has to blink a few times to make sure it is Juno embracing his mother, not Benzaiten. But the scar on the back of his forearm shows that it’s definitely Juno in his mother’s bony arms.

 

***

 

Mick’s a bit older, so he thinks he should be the responsible one. He’s seventeen, for pete’s sake. Benzaiten and Juno are fifteen and Mick feels like he should look out for them, especially in situations like this. Mick is opening and closing doors in the middle of the night in someone else’s apartment, looking for Juno after he ran off and did something dumb again.

 

Ben is easy to keep safe. He spends all his time at the tiny dance studio at the community center, rehearsing or teaching or getting ready to rehearse. Mick likes to watch him pirouette, appreciates his friend’s talent.

 

But Benzaiten is not here right now. Juno is.

 

Juno swears he doesn’t look for trouble, and Mick is a trusting guy, but at some point there’s got to be a reason why Juno’s nose has been broken five times and counting. It’s crooked now, set wrong – he’ll never be quite identical with Ben ever again. Juno is small, and fast, and cunning, and completely incapable of self-preservation. So when they were all invited to Mal Pollux’s party, Ben pulls Mick and Sasha aside at the door.

 

“Mick, Sasha,” Ben says out of Juno’s earshot. “I gotta leave early tonight, I have dance team in the morning – but can you make sure Juno gets home okay?”

 

“Yeah, of course,” Mick says. Sasha only nods.

 

This is proving to be difficult. The party is loud, raucous, filled with teenagers and alcohol and drugs. Juno slips out of Mick’s line of sight as soon as Ben leaves for the evening, and Mick wastes an hour searching for him. When he tells Sasha he’s lost Juno, Sasha just rolls her eyes and keeps dancing.

 

“Whoops, sorry,” Mick says as he opens another door and catches another pair of classmates with their hands down each other’s’ pants. He shuts the door gently and turns to rejoin the party when he spots Juno.

 

Juno is parked on the couch. He looks very small, a fifteen-year-old not even halfway through growing, next to some older kids Mick doesn’t know. Juno looks drunk and bats his eyelashes at an older boy in eyeliner. As Mick watches, Eyeliner whispers in Juno’s ear. Juno nods, so the boy pulls two tabs of paper out of his pocket and places one on Juno’s outstretched tongue before putting one on his own. Eyeliner pulls Juno into a deep, filthy kiss. Juno climbs over onto Eyeliner’s lap, sprawled out like an object. Someone wolf-whistles. Eyeliner laughs. Juno sways.

 

Eyeliner catches Mick’s eye. “Want a turn?” he calls raucously. Juno looks over his shoulder, eyes half lidded and unfocused.

 

Mick flushes, shakes his head and turns away. It’s good for Juno to experiment, Mick reckons.

 

When he looks back, Juno and Eyeliner are not where they were a few seconds ago. Goddamnit, Mick thinks.

 

So now here he is. Opening doors at random and pissing off couples trying to find some privacy. Juno isn’t in Mel’s bedroom, or the kitchen, or the bathroom. Mick is trying to get around people, trying not to get splashed with shitty beer or burned by stray cigarettes. He keeps getting turned around.

 

Eventually, he makes it to the one room he hasn’t checked. By process of elimination, Mel’s parent lives in this room. He tries to open the door, but it’s locked. He knocks loudly.

 

“Busy!” a voice yells out. Mick thinks it’s Eyeliner.

 

“Is Juno in there?” Mick calls back.

 

“Fuck off,” Eyeliner replies. “Find somewhere else to fuck.”

 

Mick keeps banging on the door relentlessly until Eyeliner finally opens it.  “What the fuck do you want, you fucking creep,” Eyeliner starts.

 

Mick looks past him, and yeah, that’s Juno, naked and passed out facedown on the mattress. Ignoring Eyeliner’s shouts, Mick shoulders his way into the room.

 

“He took what I gave him!” Eyeliner says defensively. “Not my fault he can’t handle a tab.”

 

“He’s fifteen,” Mick says absently.

 

“So?” Eyeliner scoffs. “He wanted it. You saw it.” He shrugs. “Ugly little twink, he wasn’t worth the tab,” he spits as he slinks out of the door.

 

Mick ignores this in favor of trying to shake Juno awake. It does not work. So Mick finds a pair of pants on the floor that he hopes are Juno’s and wrestles his legs into them, then pulls a random t-shirt over his head.

 

“Sasha?” Mick calls loudly.

 

Sasha seems to materialize in an instant. “What did Steel do,” she asks, rolling her eyes.

 

“Took some drugs and passed out,” Mick explains. “I think he’s okay, but can you help me get him to the hoverbike?”

 

“Yeah, yeah, but if the girl I was talking to goes home while I’m helping you carry Steel’s sorry ass, you will definitely regret it. Juno will regret it the most, but I don’t think he can understand what I’m saying right now.”

 

Together, they lift Juno out of the bed and drag him through the party. Mick feels like he can breathe again when Juno’s barely-stirring body is propped up on the back of his hoverbike.

 

“See ya tomorrow, Sasha,” Mick calls.

 

“Bye, Mick,” she replies, disappearing back into the party.

 

***

 

Only a few months after that, Mick sits down on a curb next to Sasha. It’s a hot late spring day and they are sitting in front of the bodega sharing a dented can of cola and using markers as paint on ragged fingernails. Mick and Sasha can manage companionable silence, something the Steels are completely unable to comprehend. Four cop cars rush past, sirens blaring, and neither look up.

 

Still, after a while Sasha breaks the relative quiet. “Juno is an idiot,” she begins.

 

Mick hums in agreement, examining his newly-green thumbnail.

 

“Juno stole his mom’s blaster last month,” Sasha admits.

 

Mick drops his marker. “What?”

 

“Apparently Sarah had a blaster in her purse, an old unregistered one without a stun setting,” Sasha says flatly, like she says most things these days. “Juno decided it would be safer to steal it.”

 

“He’s not wrong, that woman is a danger to herself and others. Mostly Juno.”

 

Sasha inclines her head in acknowledgement. This is a known fact. “So he kept it, apparently, and now he’s a pretty good shot.”

 

“He kept it? Does Ben know?”

 

“Yeah,” Sasha says, crumpling the empty soda can under her foot. “Remember when we were little, Juno wanted to be a cop?”

 

“Uh-huh…”

 

“Apparently you either have to have good grades to get into the police academy or you have to have special skills. Good aim is a skill they’re looking for.”

 

“That makes sense,” Mick admits. “He's barely passing, and Ben wants him to get into the police academy.” The ‘far away from Oldtown and Sarah Steel’ didn’t need to be said.

 

“Yeah.” Sasha pulls out a cigarette, lights it. Offers it to Mick, who turns it down. “Fucked up that the safest thing in this situation is stealing the gun from the adult.”

 

“Aw, come on Sasha,” Mick admonishes. His eyes suddenly grow wide. “Wait – I have an idea! I could start a blaster delivery service! If you need a blaster you could call me and I would bring it over! Sasha, it would be great – none of the danger of blaster ownership and all of the fun! Just think, we could – “

 

***

 

Mick is eighteen and freshly dropped out of Oldtown High, reveling in his freedom. He feels like the king of the freeway for real this time. He’s managed to get to adulthood without major injury, which feels like an accomplishment. He doesn’t even do anything that illegal – right now, he’s a courier, which means reading lots of maps and figuring out where people live. He’s not good at it, but he likes it, and his boss only yells at him a couple of times a day.

 

Mick and Sasha and Juno spend a lot of time at Mick’s house. Sasha and Juno still go to school, but afterwards they all squish onto Mick’s hoverbike and go back to Mick’s place. Sometimes Ben joins too, but he’s managed to get a paid position teaching people how to waltz, so he does that three days a week after school. Mick’s dad has been feeding them all cloned beef stew for years, fretting about Juno’s stunted growth and Sasha’s boniness. Mick is glad that Juno has someone vaguely parental in his life – he’s never minded sharing.

 

Things have been getting worse for the Steels, Mick knows – Sarah has stopped trying to hold down a job, stopped leaving the apartment for longer than it takes to acquire alcohol or her drug of choice. She’s becoming scarecrow-thin as she stops snorting pills and starts shooting up. He knows all this from Ben, who worries; and Juno, who scoffs.

 

Lately, Mick has been noticing more than just his dad’s concern for his friends. He and Sasha and Juno lay around on the living room rug, laughing and playing cards, and Mick’s uncle Theo begins to join them more and more, laughing at Juno’s jokes and winking at him. Once they all watch a movie on the old TV and Juno sits on the floor, but by the time they turn the lights on at the end of the movie Juno is asleep leaning against Theo’s leg, and Theo’s hands are buried in his hair. Mick frowns but doesn’t say anything, just like he didn’t say anything last week when his uncle bought Juno a new coat and ran his hands up and down Juno telling him how handsome he looked. Something isn’t right.

 

 Mick may not be smart, but he’s not an idiot. He knows his uncle sells pills, and that’s how they make rent every month. He knows perfectly well that Juno is always up to try new drugs. He did not realize how compatible those things were until he comes home late from a shift at the bodega a couple blocks from his apartment.

 

Juno is standing on the street corner, eyes darting, holding himself in the curiously hunched way drug dealers do. Mick’s heart drops to his feet and he hopes against hope that Juno gets his drugs from someone, anyone else.

 

“Jay, buddy,” Mick calls, slowing to a stop on the hovercycle.

 

Juno’s face falls, eyes revealing his thought process as he considers running and decides that Mick would catch up with the hovercycle. Juno stays where he is, straightening up so his coat falls in straight lines down his sides, small bulges in the pockets now visible that were concealed when he was hunched down.

 

“What do you want, Mercury,” Juno asks flatly.

 

“What are you selling?” Mick asks innocently.

 

“Nothing you want.” Juno turns his back on Mick, leans against the concrete side of the building.

 

“Hey, I could use drugs if I wanted to!” Mick defends his potential coolness. “I just don’t want to.”

 

“Sure, Mercury, just don’t scare off the customers, okay?” Juno says distractedly, eyeing a plainclothes cop passing by.

 

“Juno!” Mick yells to get his attention.

 

“Shut up, Mick!” Juno hisses. “Look, Ma stopped going to work months ago and if I don’t make rent, we don’t have anywhere to live.”

 

“I know that, Juno, I just – “ Mick hesitates. “Are you working for my uncle?”

 

Juno looks abashed. “Well, yeah,” he admits. “He sells most of the Sola around here, and he needed someone to take over this side of town.”

 

“Jayjay, buddy, are you taking this stuff?” Mick needs to know. It’s one thing to sell, but did his uncle get Juno hooked?

 

“Just a bit, just to get through,” Juno says easily, and for the first time Mick sees Juno’s face like an outsider must, all dark shadows, rings under his eyes, cheekbones too prominent. “It’s not a problem, okay Mercury?”

 

Mick feels like his friend is a ghost, standing in front of him, shifting his weight and darting his eyes. “Yeah Juno, just… be careful, all right? Promise me you won’t let this get out of control?”

 

“Promise me you won’t start any other stupid schemes?” Juno scoffs, but he nods. That’s all Mick can hope for, most of the time.

 

***

 

Juno is oddly sad when he tells them. Mick, Sasha, Ben, Juno – they’re in the scrubby Oldtown Park, lying on the dusty ground and passing a joint between them. It’s dark, and Mick swears if he squints he can see at least one star.

 

“It’s not a star, Mick, it’s just –“  Sasha starts for the umpteenth time.

 

“Okay, but how do you know?” Mick fires back like always.

 

Ben and Juno are oddly quiet today. They are all pretty stoned by the time Juno clears his throat. They all sit up to look at him. In the dark, the glow of the joint illuminates the hollows of his face.

 

“I got into the police academy,” Juno says, eyes cast upwards. “I found out today. I leave in two weeks.” It’s dark, but Mick thinks he sees a tear travel down his face.

 

“Jayjay! That’s awesome!” Mick yells, tackling Juno into a bear hug.

 

Sasha pats his shoulder and tells him, “Good job, Steel.”

 

Ben is crying openly now. “I’m so proud of you,” he sniffles.

 

Juno extricates himself from Mick’s hug. “Ben, we can leave, we can finally get away from her.” He grabs Ben’s shoulders, shakes him a little. “We can get an apartment and never see Ma again. This is all we’ve ever wanted, you can teach dance uptown and I’ll be a cop and – “

 

“No, Juno,” Ben says quietly.

 

Juno recoils like he’s been slapped. “What?”

 

“I – “ Ben takes a breath. “If we leave – she won’t make it. She’ll get evicted, or starve, or overdose.”

 

“That’s not my problem,” Juno says angrily. Silently, Mick agrees.

 

“It’s my problem,” Ben says evenly.

 

“Why the fuck is it anyone’s problem but hers?” Juno jumps to his feet.

 

Ben stands slowly, straightening up and dusting himself off. “Because she needs me, Juno. Let me finish. I know you need to leave. She’s not safe, not for you. But she’s never hurt me as much or as often as she’s hurt you. I’ll be fine. You can be a hotshot cop and visit me back here. I’m happy here, Juno. I have the studio and my students, and Miss Nestor says I can take over as head instructor in a few years when she retires. My life is here. And Ma needs my help.”

 

“That’s bullshit,” Juno sputters.

 

“It’s not,” Ben says, still without a hint of anger. Sasha and Mick watch Juno intently. 

 

Juno’s anger seems close to boiling over, but he seems so fragile as he says, “She’s going to do something really bad one day, Ben. If I’m not here to take it, what if she starts on you?”

 

“Then I’ll defend myself, or I’ll leave,” Ben says.

 

“But – “

 

“This is my decision, Juno. I’m staying with Ma.” Ben turns and leaves, kicking up dust as he walks back through the park towards home.

 

Juno looks frozen in place and Mick has no idea how to make this better.  

 

***

 

The second time Mick goes to the Steel residence is the last. Near the end of the day, his comms light up with a message from Juno, who has not stayed in contact very well since leaving for cop academy.

 

So it’s a shock when Juno’s number flashes across the screen. “BEN GONE. COME TO APARTMENT. PLEASE.”

 

Mick’s heart drops to his feet.

 

There are cops outside the apartment. All the criminals who frequent the block are tucked farther away from daylight. It’s not hard to slip inside the old building, even through the front door. The elevator is down, so Mick takes the stairs.

 

The sixth floor hallway is crawling with cops. One stops him pretty quickly.

 

“Are you here for the kid?” she asks gruffly.

 

“Juno?” Mick asks dumbly.

 

“Yeah. God, this case is horrible. The mom killed one of her sons in cold blood and then called the other to brag about it,” she says, shaking her head. “Go on in. He’s in the kitchen.

 

So Mick walks in because he can’t think of anything to say. Everything looks the same as the time he’d burst in nearly a decade earlier. Dirty dishes, dirty clothes, dust everywhere. Mick catches a glimpse of a body covered in a sheet. The reality of what happened hits him and he throws up in the sink.

 

Juno is wearing his uniform, Mick notes distantly as he wipes his mouth on his sleeve. Juno is sitting at the rickety kitchen table, eyes wide, rocking slightly. He doesn’t turn to look at Mick.

 

“Mick?” Juno says in a tiny voice.

 

“Yeah, Jayjay?”

 

“He’s gone.” At this point anyone else would collapse into grief and tears, but Juno seems to be beyond that.

 

Mick can only nod. There doesn’t seem to be anything left to say.

**Author's Note:**

> some inspiration drawn from "our dreams were like fugitive warlords" by howlikeagod. the markers as nail polish thing is from another penumbra fic i cannot remember right now :( 
> 
> title from "high hawk season" by the mountain goats.


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